Amounting to Nothing

by Karis Walsh

  She noticed a family gathered on one of the tiny lawns that separated an apartment building from the sidewalk, and her mental construction project paused. A woman with gray hair pulled back in a tight bun sat on a chair in the center of the space, near a table with some balloons and a cake. She was surrounded by adults ranging in age from twenties to eighties. Little kids, some shirtless and some shoeless, ran and played around the group of adults, while a cluster of teens leaned on the brick wall between the apartment entrance and the grass. As she and Dennis cruised by, a pedestrian waved and called out to the woman, and then he was pulled in and assimilated into the group. A few of the younger adults moved away to join the teenagers. Flux and movement, a blurring of lines between families and strangers. There was no sign of wealth or prosperity here, except for the unity and friendliness she could see even from a distance.

  “Where would you put the entrance to your town square?” Dennis asked, bringing her back inside the car.

  “On the north side of the block,” Merissa replied without hesitation. She had the site fully developed in her head and on paper in her office. She pointed toward the east, where Mount Rainier would be visible from the hillside in daylight. “That way, we maximize the number of condos with a view of the mountain. The block on the north side is a prime location for our next renovation project, and we could eventually connect the two. Maybe even put an elevated walkway between them…”

  She faded to a stop as she started to imagine the next block and the types of stores and services they could provide to the local residents. Like a cascade of dominoes, the rest of Tacoma’s city blocks were emptied of the old and refilled with new homes and shops. A new thought came to mind after watching the celebrating family, and she easily added it to her list of renovations.

  “What if each block had an apartment building on the non-view side with less expensive units? If we use standard materials and go with a simpler design, we could offer a more affordable option right next to the luxury condos. That would give people more options for buying or renting, instead of limiting our potential residents to the wealthy ones who want to live downtown. We’d expand our market, and—”

  “Whoa,” Dennis said with a laugh as he drove along the north side of the block. “Keep focused on this block for now, and on the style and quality of housing the Morgan Group is known for. Always keep this in mind, Merissa. Investors need to be able to imagine themselves living and working in the buildings they’re funding. Even if they never set foot in any of them, they will expect to see a certain level of security, privacy, and comfort in your designs.”

  Merissa frowned. “How many people can afford the kinds of communities we’ve been bringing to Tacoma? There are so many new waterfront and view condos popping up, and not enough people to fill them. Doesn’t it make sense to diversify, especially on the west side of each block? No one will pay the amount we need to make if all they can see from their windows is another neighborhood that needs renovations.”

  “Good point, Merissa, but for now I want you to focus on what we do best. Align your vision with the other Morgan Group projects just this once, so you’re confident and prepared when you pitch your ideas to Kensington.”

  Merissa was busy trying to rein in her expanding plans, and she nearly missed the meaning of Dennis’s words. “When I…you mean I’m doing the proposal? With my own design?”

  Dennis patted her on the knee. “It’s a big step, but you’re ready to take point on a project this size. We’ll work together to get a mock-up done by Thursday, and we’ll meet with him next week.”

  “I’d hug you if we weren’t driving,” Merissa said. She figured the smile on her face must be goofy and huge because she felt it all the way from her toes to her head. She was one step closer to making the dreams she had for her city a reality.

  “Of course you would. You’ll make a fortune if this deal goes through.”

  Merissa shrugged. She’d grown up having a fortune, but she hadn’t discovered a real purpose until this job. Even if she had to learn how to compromise before she’d even stepped into the meeting room, by altering her elaborate plans, she was willing to do what it took to make Dennis proud. He hadn’t steered her wrong yet, and she’d known she would have to get better at letting go of some of the elements she held dear in her visions. She hadn’t expected him to move her forward in this way so soon, and she wouldn’t let her ego get in the way.

  She hadn’t processed much of Dennis’s earlier statement after hearing that they were going to use her design, but she finally turned her thoughts to the second thing he’d said. “Why Kensington and not Edwin Lemaine?”

  “It might be time for a change. See what some new blood can do,” he said, with a casual shrug. Merissa wasn’t fooled. Dennis never did anything on a whim. He had a calculated reason for pitching to a developer other than the one they usually used. She wondered if he’d tell her his reasons before the meeting or after. “Based on the other projects Jeff has done, I’ll bet he’ll be inspired by your vision. We’ll see how it goes Monday, and if we don’t feel he’s right for the job, we can pitch to Lemaine.”

  Merissa filed away a mental note to research Jeff Kensington’s career before the weekend was over, to get tips on presenting her proposal and to help her decide if he was the best person for the project. She shuffled through her index cards again, looking for one with a sketch she’d made of some decorative stonework. “Remember the cornice on that building we saw today in Pioneer Square? I’d like something similar on the condos, to keep them from looking too modern and boxy.”

  She saw the edge of a white card under her seat. As she bent down to get it, she heard the dull thwack of a rock or something hitting the car and felt Dennis weave a little out of his lane. Her stomach twisted at the movement and she sat up quickly.

  “Oof.” She held up the missing card. “I might get sick after that maneuver, but it was worth it because I found the drawing.”

  Dennis didn’t answer, and Merissa looked over at him. He was staring ahead, with a surprised expression on his face. He slowly pulled over to the curb and put the car in park with what looked like a tremendous effort.

  “Dennis? What’s wrong?” Merissa struggled to figure out what she was seeing, what had gone wrong in the seconds she’d been looking away. “What happened?”

  “Karen,” he whispered, still staring straight ahead, his eyes wide and vacant. “Tell Karen I…”

  “Tell Karen what?” Merissa’s confusion was steadily rising as panic fueled the already queasy feeling she had. She saw blood slowly begin to drip from his chin and onto his neatly pressed khakis. “Dennis? Dennis? Dennis! ”

  Her voice got louder with each repetition of his name, and she reached for his chin to make him look at her and explain what was happening. The fourth time she called his name was a scream.

  Chapter Two

  Billie Mitchell sat on her heels in the dusty alleyway between abandoned shops. Her back was pressed so hard against the comfortingly solid wall behind her, that she knew she’d have bumps and creases in her skin from the irregularly shaped bricks. Sweat gathered between and under her breasts, and her leg muscles ached from the miles of crouching, crawling progress they’d made to get here, to the center of an enemy-filled town. She sat perfectly still, not shifting to flex her cramping calves or reaching up to wipe away a drop of sweat caught on her long eyelashes. She held her M4 against her chest as if she was cradling a teddy bear.

  Someone had been out here for a cigarette recently. Her nose and throat burned with the scent of cheap smoke, probably laced with more than nicotine. She kept her breathing shallow. Weak, sore, burning. On the outside, she was calm and untouched by the swirling dust and the stench of the trash-filled alley.

  “Hey, Beast,” Mike whispered. She turned and looked at his grinning face. The sun was behind him, creating a halo of light around his head. Regulations meant little out here, and he hadn’t shaved for days. “I’ll bet you dessert that
the cockroach over there makes it to the street corner before we do.”

  A large roach scuttled along on the other side of the alley, traveling over rocks and twigs with purpose. Their point man, Hamilton, was either the most cautious person alive or just the most closely related to the sloth. Smart money was on the bug, and dessert—even though it was probably only a tiny package of cookies—was a hot commodity these days. Still…

  “You’re on,” Billie said, unable to resist a bet. She raised her voice slightly. “Yo, Hamill. We’ve got to be at the LZ before dawn. Let’s move.”

  “No fair,” Mike protested. He stood up and walked over to the roach. “Hurry up!”

  “Mike!” Billie yelled, suddenly terrified. She ran toward him and caught one last look at his relaxed smile and cheerful blue eyes before the cockroach exploded and he disappeared.

  “Aunt Billie! Aunt Billie!”

  The children’s shouts were accompanied by a stomach-crushing leap onto the bed. Billie gasped, pressing her palms into the mattress as she struggled to figure out where she was and whether she was in danger. As the weirdly combined fragments of truth and fiction making up her dream shattered, she managed to see what was in front of her open eyes. She was in her apartment. The small weights currently holding her down were Mike’s children. She was safe.

  Mere seconds passed before she felt her reflexes relax enough for her to tickle the kids until they writhed and giggled on her bed. Another few moments and her heart rate and breathing slowed and she was laughing along with them. Even though she tried not to sleep deeply enough to lose herself when the children were at her house, the wrenching moments between waking and settling back into her present surroundings were always a little frightening, especially when her two human alarm clocks kept her from easing slowly and carefully into the wakeful world.

  The three of them collapsed back on the bed, and Billie’s gaze moved to the photo on her dresser of her and Mike sitting outside a canvas tent. A wicked dust storm made the sky behind them look threatening and dark, but they wore shorts and bright smiles as they posed for the picture. They were a contrasting pair—Mike was tall and blond with the handsome and healthy look of a Tommy Hilfiger model, while Billie was shorter and dark-haired. She was private, both in expression and personality, while he was as open as anyone she’d ever met. They were an unlikely combination, but they’d become best friends from the first moment they met. And now he was gone…

  Billie refused to get sad while his kids were here. “Who wants pancakes?” she asked, getting out of bed and pulling a sweatshirt on over the T-shirt and sweats she was wearing.

  “I do! I do!” Ryan and Callie were only a year apart in age, at six and seven, and most of their conversation seemed to be in the form of a chorus. Words and phrases were echoed between them, proving how close they were as siblings, not just in years.

  Billie walked to the kitchen like a monster in a horror film, lurching and dragging her feet since one child was wrapped around each calf. Their infectious smiles and obvious delight at staying with her helped her maintain her happy mood—they were as good for her as she seemed to be for them. They sat on stools at the chipped laminate counter while she cooked, chattering on about friends at school and the vacation they were taking with Mike’s parents later in the summer. Billie cracked eggs and poured milk while she listened. She’d spent months in therapy after she’d returned from her deployment, minus Mike forever, but the sessions had never been as helpful as times like this were for her. The failure had been partly due to the mission’s level of security—how could any therapist really help her when the most she could say was some version of I was somewhere, and something happened, and now I’m sad. No specifics meant no real understanding or sympathy. Billie was so accustomed to keeping classified information out of her conversations that she even omitted it in her own mind. She never thought of the place names or the specifics of her missions, especially the final one. Everything was vague. Mike had been there, and she had been whole. Then he was gone and she was bleeding and in pain.

  She was healed on the outside, now. And her occasional weekends with Mike’s kids healed her insides a little more every time. They anchored her in the present as few other things and people were able to do. They reminded her of the past and of Mike, but led her into the future as well, with their conversations and anticipation and the glimpses they showed of the teens and adults they’d eventually become. She was able to settle somewhere in the middle while she was talking to them. She was here , the same way she was when riding a horse or patrolling with her mounted police unit.

  Billie ladled the first batch of pancake batter onto an electric griddle and got syrup and butter out of the fridge while the discs browned. She flipped them and smashed them with her spatula, preferring thin, crepe-like pancakes to the fluffy thick ones she got in restaurants. A throwback to the breakfasts her dad used to cook when he was at home and not at sea on the fishing boats. Old habits.

  Billie piled the finished pancakes onto plates and started another batch while Ryan and Callie ate. She gave them the second batch as well before making a plateful for herself and dousing it with sugary syrup that had probably never seen the inside of an actual maple tree. The three of them were hungrily demolishing the remaining pancakes when someone knocked on the door.

  “Mom’s here!” Ryan yelled, hopping off the stool and running to answer the door. Beth Grant came in and dropped some bags on the floor before grabbing Ryan in a hug.

  “I missed you,” she said, putting him down and hugging Callie next. She picked up the bags again and brought them into the kitchen. She gave Billie a kiss on the cheek. “I missed you, too. I brought you some grown-up food to thank you for watching Ryan and Callie again.”

  Billie had been watching Beth’s entrance with a feeling of relief. The years following Mike’s death had been hard on her—Beth had seemed to age twice as fast as normal, and the blond good looks that had meshed so well with her husband’s had been overlaid with dark circles and frown lines. Lately, Beth had been smiling more and her skin color was brighter and healthier. Billie had a suspicion there was someone behind those changes, but she was waiting for Beth to bring up the topic first. She peered into one of the bags and saw a bottle of red wine and a six-pack of beer. “Grown-up food? All I see in here are grown-up drinks.”

  Beth started emptying the other bags. “I brought steaks for that silly little grill you have on your patio, and fruits and vegetables. Real food.”

  “I eat real—” Billie started to defend her eating habits, but Beth waved her off.

  “When I was here on Friday, I noticed that your fridge was full of the kids’ favorite foods and old takeout containers. You only buy groceries for them.”

  Billie wanted to protest, but she decided to let Beth believe her statement was true, and that Billie only cooked on the rare weekends when the kids were with her and the rest of the time either grabbed a bite in a nearby bar or brought home dinner in a fast-food sack. In reality, Billie rarely ate takeout, and the cartons Beth had seen were her coworker’s leftovers from when he had visited her earlier in the week. Don Lindstrom’s wife didn’t approve of him eating fried food and burgers, so he came to Billie’s once or twice a week with a contraband meal. Billie gave him safe haven, with the warning that if Marie ever asked her what he was eating at her place she wouldn’t lie for him.

  Billie didn’t want to admit she had a fridge full of children’s food because she ate the same way herself. Chicken nuggets, fish sticks, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on soft white bread. As much as she tried to break away from the past, Billie couldn’t keep herself from craving the foods she’d eaten as a child. She put up with the teasing she got from the other members of her team, and at least when the kids were here, she had an excuse for eating the way she did.

  Billie put a large bag of broccoli in the vegetable crisper while Ryan and Callie rinsed their breakfast dishes. “How was your weekend?” she asked after Beth
had sent the children to the spare bedroom to pack their things.

  “It was fine. I learned a lot, and the keynote speaker was one of my favorite professors back when I was getting my teaching certificate.” Beth put the breakfast plates into the sink and ran the tap water while she talked, keeping her face averted from Billie. “I feel guilty leaving the kids with you while I travel so much.”

  “You don’t need to feel guilty. Not at all,” Billie said. She kept herself busy rearranging the groceries in the fridge and giving Beth some space. Beth’s job as a school administrator meant she had to travel to seminars and symposiums on a regular basis. And Beth knew how much Billie loved having Mike’s kids be part of her life. She figured Beth’s concerns were stemming from a different source.

  “There’s this guy…”

  Billie kept her face neutral even though she wanted to smile. Of course there’s a guy she wanted to say. She’d suspected as much for several months now. “Who is he?” she asked.

  “He’s a principal in the Ferndale school district. We’ve been to most of the same seminars over the past year and we talk a lot. About work. We had coffee together.”

  She said the last sentence with as much shame as if she’d confessed to murdering someone. Billie closed the refrigerator door and faced her.